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Featured Blog Post

Dear NT-NL Leaders:

As leaders in our congregations in the best of times you are challenged to respond, adapt, and learn. Over the last 18-20 months that response, adaption, and change has come in a time of great uncertainty. In October we have a number of opportunities for you to take those responses and create learning from them. The first is our 2021 Leadership Convocation “From Reaction to Response: Changed for Good.” This opportunity is open to lay and rostered leaders and is a hybrid event, both in-person at Briarwood and also available completely online. In offering this we are as synod and Briarwood hoping to model our own learnings about best practices for hybrid events.

Another completely online event featuring leaders from across our synod is the series “Leading for God’s Future: Service on the Congregational Council” beginning October 21st focused on church council leadership. This will be a great series to help you and leaders in your congregation grow and learn from others who are doing this work.

These programs enhance and build upon established NT-NL leadership development avenues such as the Parish Lay Ministry Academy, Secondary School of Theological Education, and our continuously growing connections to coaching. This includes a grant given in 2020 by our Mission Endowment Fund to provide funds for staff and NT-NL leaders to be coached. This is another example of how the MEF is supporting leaders in our synod, and I encourage you to join in and express generosity for the “Gifted and Giving” MEF online event October 16th.

Leadership is challenging in the best of times. We are living in a difficult season. Yet God sustains us and offers us opportunity in community to grow and learn so that we can clearly proclaim the gospel. I encourage you to take part in these events offered by your synod leadership. We do this work better #InMissionTogether.

Bishop Gronberg

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MEF Seeds That Change

The COUNTDOWN has begun to the October 16, 10:00 am premiere of the NT-NL Mission Endowment Fund CELEBRATION VIDEO PRESENTATION of Gifted and Giving….How Grace Works. Visit the NT-NL Facebook page to see a new short video story posted everyday between now and then: https://www.facebook.com/NTNLMissionArea.

Please be generous with your support to increase our grant giving ministry: https://giftedandgiving.org/donate/ or https://tithe.ly/give_new/www/#/tithely/give-one-time/1183611?giving_to=Mission%20Endowment%20Fund

Visit the special website for details about the campaign and more information about the 20 inspiration video authors: https://giftedandgiving.org/

And visit the NT-NL YouTube Channel Playlist for all 20 videos: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLE1z_uxSxKHZCCD-lV9XRtFDYazUh_KZx

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NT-NL Leadership Convocation

Briarwood Leadership Center, Argyle, TX

At this time, we are planning for this to be a hybrid event, offered both in person and online.

We will be focusing on how to capitalize on the new things you have been doing. How to turn our reactions and fast learnings in pandemic into more long term parts of our life. To live into the hybrid in person/online future that is a reality for us all.

To assist us in this work we will be led by Dr. Alicia Granholm. Dr. Granholm has two decades of experience in church leadership in mainline and non-denominational settings in the United States and abroad. Most recently she has been coaching four of our NT-NL congregations who are involved in the Leadership for Faithful Innovation Cohort that I highlighted in my 2021 synod assembly report. She will work with us on a theology of innovation as well as how to make new things become part of our life. Joining her will also be, living into our hybrid culture, online conversation partners that will enrich our time including Mikka McCracken, Executive Director for innovation with the ELCA Churchwide office.

Dr. Cláudio Carvalhaes is a professor of liturgy and worship at Union Seminary in New York. He will be joining us online to facilitate conversation about worship and life in our new reality. Carvalhaes, a native of Brazil, has both studied and is a cross cultural scholar. He will help us think theologically about our praxis of worship in person and online. To consider practices that engage all participants as much as possible in the liturgy, the “work of the people.” Dr. Carvalhaes is featured in this August 26 article: Ten Theology Books to Watch For.

It will be a good time for us to gather, think together, and learn. Click here for a tentative detailed schedule. (as of September 2)

Please register here: https://tithe.ly/event-registration/#/4182327. Registration = $50.

If you need overnight lodging (additional fee), please email jason@ntnl.org with your request, and we’ll be in touch closer to the event date.

Disclaimer: In the interest of safety and public health due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we reserve the right to enforce public health and safety measures, depending on the conditions at the time, at our discretion.

Full details, and updates, can be found here: https://www.ntnl.org/event/leadership-convocation-2021/

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Courageous Leadership Series with ELCA Coaching

Dear ELCA Leaders,

You are invited to join ELCA Coaching at 1pm Central on the First and Third Wednesday of October to learn some possibly surprising, and some definitely humorous, things about COURAGEOUS LEADERSHIP. We are working on two special guests (well-known to NT-NL leaders) for October 20, and we are inviting you to bring a spirit of curiosity and openness to discerning how and where Spirit might be calling you forward as a leader in your life, family, work, ministry, community, and the world. There will also be time for small groups in breakout rooms so that leaders across the church can continue to learn from each other and leave each gathering with at least one action step.

Login information can be found on the ELCA Coaching website: https://www.elcacoaching.org/events/courageous-leadership

Recordings from past months can be found here: https://www.elcacoaching.org/podcasts/media/series/courageous-leadership

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MEF Grant Applications due October 31

Applications (due October 31) are now being accepted for 2022 Grants to support NT-NL projects and ministries. Information is available at https://www.ntnl.org/ministries/mef/grant-application/. Contact Linda Ness for more information: mef@ntnl.org or 682-429-3446.

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ELCA Board of Pensions Update

Please be advised that the address for the Board of Pensions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, doing business as Portico Benefit Services, changed as of September 15, 2021, and you should update your records as applicable to our new address:

Portico Benefit Services
7700 France Ave. S., Ste. 350
Minneapolis, MN 55435-2802

Board of Pensions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
7700 France Ave. S., Ste. 350
Minneapolis, MN 55435-2802

Board of Pensions of the ELCA
7700 France Ave. S., Ste. 350
Minneapolis, MN 55435-2802

Their phone numbers, fax numbers, and email addresses are not changing.

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Mission Investment Fund Options

The Mission Investment Fund (MIF) is a ministry of the ELCA with faith and finance at its center. Planning new construction? Building improvements? Refinancing an existing loan? Consider MIF. Here’s why:

• Decades of experience. We’re different from your average lending institution. As a ministry of the ELCA, we understand your needs.
• The numbers are in your favor. Interest rates on loans are at near-historic lows. Unlike many commercial lenders, we charge no points or loan origination fees.
• Faithful stewardship. When you work with us, you help support other ministries of this church and the communities they serve.

Ready to explore your options? Let us help.

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Churches and Cooperatives Toolkit | Solidarity Circles

From our friends at Vanderbilt Divinity School | Wendell-Cook Program in Religion and Justice:

We have an Exciting Announcement!

We are launching the Churches and Cooperatives Toolkit in collaboration with the Southeast Center for Cooperative Development. This online toolkit is meant to educate and equip faith leaders, organizers, and clergy on how their faith can propel them into solidarity with the cooperative movement.

On November 17 at 6:30pm, we’ll host a launch event. Register here!

But there’s more! The launch event on November 17 will also feature an explanation of how faith leaders, clergy, and organizers can connect with this work through a new program called Solidarity Circles and our online training platform, Exchanges.

In coordination with our virtual training platform Exchanges, Solidarity Circles are virtual peer-networks for faith leaders, organizers, and clergy committed to the cooperative and solidarity economy. Over a five-month period (February – June 2022), participants will engage in education, dialogue, and receive coaching on a specific project and plan of action.

If you feel over-resourced and under-connected in this work, Solidarity Circles are for you! Register now!

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Internal Family Systems Workshop: Being Compassionate to Self and Others

From our friends at SMU | Perkins School of Theology:

December 2-3, 2021

Internal Family Systems is a compassionate paradigm of looking at the world and human nature that helps us get in touch with the unconscious aspects or parts of ourselves that can be roadblocks in our spiritual paths. Through Self Compassion, we are able to be more present to ourselves and others.

Sponsored by the Perkins Certificate in Spiritual Direction Program, this two-day experience will feature presentations by Dr. Nancy Wonder and Dr. Katie Winikates and will be moderated by Dr. Ruben Habito, Director of the Perkins Certificate in Spiritual Direction (Perkins CSD) program. You do not need to be enrolled in the Perkins CSD program to participate in this workshop; seasoned directors, spiritual guides, compassionate listeners, and newcomers alike are welcome.

Join us for this workshop and learn how the Internal Family Systems paradigm can be a valuable resource in the ministry of spiritual accompaniment or your own spiritual journey. Register here.

Regular Registration: September 1 – October 31 = $119.00
Late Registration: November 1 – 21 = $139.00

CEU certificate, meals, and parking available upon request through October 31. Additional fees apply.

Click here for full details.

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FREE Clergy and Church Items

From Pastor Joan Iker (grparent54@yahoo.com):